A review by slinkmalink
Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals by Saidiya Hartman
emotional
informative
inspiring
reflective
sad
slow-paced
4.5
While this was an excellent history book, describing it only as a history book doesn't do it justice, I thought it was absolutely beautiful
It felt almost anonymous in the way that it sweeps through such different lives and ones that we don't hear about much and treats each of their dreams and lives as just one in thousands of both different and shared dreams, examples of individuals in a chorus, and yet also deeply personal in its treatment of all the women it looked at.
I just thought it really brought to life in such a poetic way the people behind the limited (perspective wise and quantity wise) sources we have about black women after emancipation and I'm very glad I picked it up
It felt almost anonymous in the way that it sweeps through such different lives and ones that we don't hear about much and treats each of their dreams and lives as just one in thousands of both different and shared dreams, examples of individuals in a chorus, and yet also deeply personal in its treatment of all the women it looked at.
I just thought it really brought to life in such a poetic way the people behind the limited (perspective wise and quantity wise) sources we have about black women after emancipation and I'm very glad I picked it up
Content Warnings
Minor: Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Racism, Police brutality, Slavery, Racial slurs, Physical abuse, Pedophilia, and Forced institutionalization